CPR training kits now available for schools
More area high school students will be able to learn CPR thanks to a grant from the Missouri Foundation for Health. The American Heart Association announced last week that schools can check out its new CPR training kits at no charge. The kits contain a 22-minute practice-while-watching DVD and inflatable manikins for students to practice chest compressions.
“They can be checked out multiple times,” said Stephen Hall, AHA communications director. “If a school wants to train all the freshmen in P.E. over a two-week period and then later in the year, train another class, (the program) is designed to be flexible and be adapted to whatever the school needs.”
The kits are available for check-out through AED Solutions at Ozarks Technical Community College. To reserve a kit, district representatives are asked to first coordinate their request with the school nurse or health curriculum instructors. The DVD leads students through the instruction; teachers do not need CPR training to share the curriculum with students.
Tammy Dock, nurse at Willard High School, brought several students to try out the manikins and DVD. According to Dock, her students are anxious to learn CPR, and even middle school students have asked her about the program.
“The video is really good,” she said. “And with the teens being able to put their hands on (the manikin), just having it feel more lifelike, it’s better to get their skills that way rather than just from a book or DVD.”
The kits are designed to teach the hands-only method of CPR but come with replacement airways, face masks and cleaning wipes if the instructor wants to teach CPR with breaths.
“Our research has shown for the lay person, hands-only CPR and chest compressions can be just as effective as traditional CPR,” Hall said. “By pressing hard and fast, you are circulating the blood, which contains oxygen, until paramedics arrive and continue with advanced care.”
The districts of Fair Grove, Fordland, Logan-Rogersville, Ozark, Pleasant Hope, Republic, Strafford, Walnut Grove and Willard have already expressed interest, according to Hall, and AHA officials hope others will follow. Springfield already has a CPR training program, Hall said.
“This positions us to set an example for other schools throughout the state of Missouri,” Hall said. “If we can be an example and are successful, hopefully this will catch on and other districts will want to implement this as well.”